Elie Wiesel Timeline and World Events: From 1952

Vladka Meed shakes the hand of President Jimmy Carter at a White House Rose Garden ceremony marking the official presentation of the report of the US Holocaust Commission to the president by commission chairman Elie Wiesel (second from right, with Benjamin Meed, center). Washington, DC, September 27, 1979.

1952After studying at the Sorbonne, Elie Wiesel begins travelling around the world as a reporter for the Tel Aviv newspaper Yediot Ahronot.

1954During an interview with the distinguished French writer, Francois Mauriac, Elie is persuaded to write about his experiences in the death camps.

1955Elie Wiesel finishes a nearly 900-page manuscript in Yiddish while on assignment in Brazil. And the World Stayed Silent is published in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

1956Shortly after moving to New York City to be a permanent correspondent, Elie Wiesel is struck by a taxicab.

1957Recovered from his injuries but still a stateless person with expired visas, Elie Wiesel naturalizes to the United States.

1958 La Nuit (appearing in 1960 in English translation as Night) is published, and has since been translated into more than 30 languages.

1961Dawn is published.

1962Following his conviction for crimes against the Jewish people, Adolf Eichmann is executed in Jerusalem.

1963Elie Wiesel becomes an American citizen.

1964Elie Wiesel returns to Sighet and visits his childhood home.

He receives the Ingram Merill award and publishes The Town Beyond the Wall.

1966The Gates of the Forest and The Jews of Silence are published.

1968Legends of our Time, essays and stories, is published. Elie Wiesel wins the Prix Medicis.

1969Elie Wiesel marries Marion.

1970A Beggar in Jerusalem and One Generation After are published.

1972His son, Elisha Shlomo, is born. Elie Wiesel also serves as Distinguished Professor of Judaic Studies at the City University of New York (1972–1976).

1973In Rwanda, Juvenal Habyarimana comes to power in a military coup.

The Oath is published

1975Elie Wiesel receives the Jewish Heritage Award, Haifa University, and the Holocaust Memorial Award, New York Society of Clinical Psychologists.

1976Teaching has always been central to Elie Wiesel's work. Since 1976, he has been the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University, where he also holds the title of University Professor. He is a member of the Faculty in the Department of Religion as well as the Department of Philosophy.

1977Egyptian president Anwar Sadat makes the first visit by an Arab leader to Israel since the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948.

1991Sages and Dreamers, Portraits and Legends from the Bible, the Talmud, and the Hasidic Tradition is published.

1993Elie Wiesel gives address at the opening of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The Museum opens to the public.

In response to the atrocities occurring in Bosnia, the United Nations Security Council issues resolution 827, establishing the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. It is the first international criminal tribunal since Nuremberg.

1994Extremist leaders of Rwanda’s Hutu majority launch a campaign of extermination against the country’s Tutsi minority. In October, the UN Security Council extends the mandate of the ICTY to include a separate but linked tribunal for Rwanda, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), located in Arusha, Tanzania.

1995All Rivers Run to the Sea is published.

1998The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda issues the world’s first conviction for genocide when Jean-Paul Akayesu is judged guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity for acts he engaged in and oversaw as mayor of the Rwandan town of Taba.

1999And the Sea is Never Full and King Solomon and his Magic Ring, a book for children, are published.

2001Elie Wiesel addresses the Days of Remembrance ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda, Washington DC, saying "How does one mourn for six million people who died? How many candles does one light? How many prayers does one recite? Do we know how to remember the victims, their solitude, their helplessness? They left us without a trace, and we are their trace."

He is granted the rank of Grand-Croix in the French Legion of Honor, France (Commandeur, 1984; Grand Officier, 1990).

2002President Iliescu of Romania presents Wiesel with "The Star of Romania."

2003 In November Wiesel addresses the Tribute to Holocaust Survivors, at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, DC.

2004 In July Elie Wiesel delivers remarks “On the Atrocities in Sudan” at the Darfur Emergency Summit, convened at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York on July 14, 2004, by the American Jewish World Service and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. In September US Secretary of State Colin Powell testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that "genocide has been committed in Darfur."

Elie Wiesel receives the Commander's Cross from the Republic of Hungary and delivers the Final Report of the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania. Wiesel was chairman of the commission.

2005Elie Wiesel receives the Man of the Year award from the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, the Light of Truth award from the International Campaign for Tibet, and publishes The Time of the Uprooted, a novel.